General crowd shot 12AM

Gossip @ The Gypsy Lounge Nightclub (Havana / OneSixNine)
Note: Gypsy nightclub was formerly known late last year as gay club OneSixNine, while before that it was known as the straight club ‘Havana Club de Luxe’, where Fridays was a regular Asian RnB night. The promoters for tonight are different from the previous RnB promoters.
Assessment Time: 12:00AM – 01:45AM
Opening Hours: 10:30AM – 02:00AM
Lockout: None
Address: 169 Oxford St
Venue Website: Unkown
Promoter Website: http://www.xclusivproductionz.com http://www.facebook.com/pages/Xclusiv-Productionz/24109750459
Occurrence: Every Friday since late last year.
Outside Line: None
Dress Code / Door Policy: Casual was okay tonight. Some guys wore t-shirts, some wore collared shirts. Girls wore their typical dresses and stuff.
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: Oh I wish I remembered how much I paid tonight, but I didn’t keep a mental note. Silly me. It certainly wasn’t $25. Either $20 or $15.
Guestlist: At time of writing, the official contact is bee (at) xclusivproductionz.com
Inside: Layout hasn’t changed at all since last year under the Havana name – You walk upstairs to the second level of this building, where you are in the back of the club – on your left are bathrooms, the close right has the back bar with 2 tables in front. Far back right corner is the VIP room, with its own bar to hold a small party of 40-50 people. On the front left is a sofa area split into 4, with its own bar, and likewise for the front right. The dancefloor is at the middle front, with floorspace to hold 200 or so people.
Cloak Room: I didn’t check, but the small corner where they typically had cloak room services was closed.
Bar Prices / Line: No lines at the bars, you were getting service right away.. A Smirnoff double black costs $13.
DJs: Unknown
Music Style: Primarily American RnB tonight
Crowd & Ratio: Our group were all mid 20′s and above. The rest of the crowd were under 25. It was approximately 50%-60% Asian with the rest being European with a trickle of Pacific Islander. Considering there were about 20-30 of us in total, it is not a very good representation of what this place would be like if it were to reach capacity.
Entertainment: None. Tickets were offered to Good Vibrations Festival on the promotional poster, but these never materialised into any sort of competition in the club while I was there. I might have missed out by coming late.
Atmosphere: Depressingly dead. Everything was set – bars, DJ, lights, even a photographer, but there was a distinct lack of humanly bodies. We were hoping it would pick up later at around midnight to 1AM, but it only marginally increased in population
Video Montage:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Also copious amounts of alcohol were called for.

M and myself

Bumping into my brother
A tap on the shoulder – It’s my 20 year old brother. Oh Jesus holy sweet Christ…  He’s looking at me, with a random girl next to me. He probably saw us making out earlier –  Not awkward at all, and some responsible older brother I am. He was here with other friends for a birthday.

Arrivederci
Special K and co left around 1:15AM. We left 1:45AM.

Final Thoughts
It is sad to see the old Havana turn into a dead event under new promoter, as the venue itself is quite good. I’m not expecting this event to last for much longer – something magical needs to happen. I was hoping for some renovations during the gay phase, but it appears (from what I could tell) that nothing was changed. If you have been before and enjoyed it, it would be best to keep those happy thoughts in your memory and not ruin it by visiting this event.

Gossip @ Gypsy Nightclub: 2/10

Judging Panel

A friends birthday at Havana, so here we go!

Candy Dreams (Final night) @ Havana club deluxe

Assessment Time: 11:30PM – 02:00AM
Opening Hours: 10:30PM – 02:00AM
Lockout: None
Website: N/a
Address: 169 Oxford St, Sydney
Dress Code / Door Policy: anything goes.
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: $15 on guestlist.
Occurence: Tonight was the final night of this particular event.
Inside: Dancefloor for about 250 people surrounded by lounges, and 3 bars. 
Cloak Room: $4 for standard size. $6 for larger items
Music: RnB, House mashup.
Crowd: Asian.
Entertainment: Modelling show. Tonight was the grand final where 8 of the most beautiful girls from previous rounds, strut it out for the $1000 grand prize.
Atmosphere: Dead. Pretty much the worst I’ve seen Havana at.
Video: 360 from the side bar:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Timeline:
It’s dead
The first thing that we see as we walk in, is that the entire place is dead. Amazingly dead. There were approximately zero people on the dancefloor, and about 10-20 people around the floor. It was a sad sight, maybe the promoters weren’t bothered seeing it was the final night.

The modelling show
Tonight was the finals of who is the prettiest girl, and there were 8 beauties. You would imagine people would pack this place out for this event, but not really. The girls strutted their stuff, and someone won $1000. Nobody was here to see them compete at all. It was a shame. Here’s a little snippet:

Click here to view the embedded video.

class

Meditating

Arrivederci
The place closed at 2AM, and not the usual 4AM, which was surprising, but also not surprising considering the deadness of the place.

Recommendation
I can no longer recommend Havana for a night, however it doesn’t matter anymore, as tonight was the last night of the Candy Dreams events.

Candy Dreams (Final Night) – 2/10.

Asian Night at Havana - Thursday 1st April 2010

Good Friday is on tomorrow and all the clubs in Sydney are closed that day, so they are open Thursday night in lieu… Just left Space with Daz, to meet up with M and some other female friends, so here we go!

Candy Dreams Lingerie Party @ Havana Club de Luxe

Assessment Time: Midnight – 02:30am
Opening Hours: 10:30pm – 03:00am
Website: http://www.havanaclub.com.au, http://www.teamhkr.com 
Address: 169 oxford st, Darlinghurst Sydney 
Dress Code / Door Policy: Casual ok. I had dress shoes, a vest and collared shirt on. Others wore t-shirts and some girls wore corsets tonight. 
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: $25. $20 on guestlist before midnight. I employed use of my free pass from the last week I visited Havana. 
Guestlist: See promoter website 
Inside: Walk upstairs two flights of stairs to the top level of the building, where Havana is. Main dancefloor for 250 or so people, with 3 bars on 3 sides, and DJ on the 4th wall. Lounges and carpeted areas surround the dancefloor.
Cloak Room:$4
Bar: Didn’t drink tonight
Music: RnB with the occasional House mashup
Crowd: Mostly asian with a mix of the others such as euro, aussie. Mostly local.
Entertainment: Podiums in the middle in front of the DJ and next to him. Dancing poles are not installed tonight.
Atmosphere: It was a Thursday, so it wasn’t as packed as a typical Friday night, nethertheless it was still busy enough to keep it away from the status of ‘dead’. Later around 2am it did die down considerably.
Video - 360 View of the main floor around midnight

Click here to view the embedded video.

Timeline:
It’s a Lingerie Party and well.. where was the lingerie?
Well all my female friends here were dressed in corsets. Altogether in the club I could probably count about 10 or less females in corsets/lingerie including my friends – I wanted to perve on girls who I didn’t know! Nethertheless it was a welcome sight for pervy eyes. A shame there were not more girls dressed skimpily. They should have a club out there that has dress up themes every week! Oh wait.. that’s The Retro.

Girls up on the podium dancing

We busted each other

I went on a date with a girl a two nights ago. Tonight I saw her grinding with some random dude tonight, and she saw me granding with a girl. Our eyes meet, and it was totally not awkward. hahaha.. and yet I wonder why I am single.

The 2 hour grind
After being in the club for 20 minutes the girl who I was dancing with at Space, got bored and followed me here to Havana, and so I did my part and grinded with her and Daz for about 90-120 minutes.. sandwich style in the middle of the floor. Basically she would face me grinding, and then after a while turn about face and continue. EVERYONE in the club is staring at us. Some are smiling, and some are disgusted. Most are guys of the former category. You would think something further would happen, but it never materialised.

Video: 2 girls up on the podium shaking their stuff

Click here to view the embedded video.

Arrivederci
After the arduous grinding session, the three of us leave. Friends were shaking their heads at me. C’mon, what is wrong with two guys and a girl leaving a club, holding hands?!? Gimme a break!!

Recommendation
Well tonight was a once off Thursday event – but it was better than Flow’s once off event on Christmas Eve – Would come here again. More people would have been better, but this was a pretty good turn out for Thursday – Similar to Space Nightclub – Entry price however should have been cheaper for a Thursday. Flow Thursday last year was only $10.

Candy Dreams @ Havana Club – 6.5/10

3am in Havana Asian RnB night.

A new promoter has taken over Havana for two weeks only. Last week was packed out, and tonight was week two. I somehow got stuck at Haymarket Hotel, but eventually worked my way to Havana, albeit late at 2:30am, so here we go!

Katsuyaku Girls @ Havana Club de Luxe

Assessment Time: 2:30am – 4:00am
Website: http://www.havanaclub.com.au
Address: 169 Oxford St, Darlinghurst, Sydney
Dress Code / Door Policy: Casual ok. I was wearing a top hat, collared shirt, jeans and dress shoes, which had no complaints upon entry. Entry Fee / Cover Charge: $25 full price after midnight. They’ve upped it and it hurts my wallet.
Guestlist: Check facebook page.
Inside: One main danceflor for about 200 or so people. Both sides are lounge and booth areas. DJ at the front, and a bar on each other side – Enough to keep one happy
Cloak Room: $4 Bar: Didn’t drink tonight Music: At point of arrival (2.30am) it was some rnb, hip hop and house all mixed up.
Crowd: Asian with a few euros and islanders as well. It’s a little mixed.
Entertainment: Two dancing poles. Earlier in the night the Katsujuku girls were dancing the poles to the amazement of the crowd. There is also an MC tonight to keep the night going.
Atmosphere: Enough people and barely enough women to keep wanting to dance. I was surprised at the number of people left at this time.

Video
(I caught it during the house segment. Look at the crowd go!)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Timeline
I’m not alone
M invited me here, but he’s nowhere. He’s already left and dogged me. Bastard! But luckily for me, a girl is madly yelling out my name and waving at me as soon as I walk in. It’s a friend who I met in Melbourne for her birthday just two months ago. Insane. STRAIGHT INTO DANCE MODE. We hop up on the pole to dance and spin around the floor until she has to go.

with Melly @ Havana Club de Luxe Sydney

A cage of birds.
So the Harajuku girls – all 5 or so of them have apparently changed outfits into something normal and have rejoined the dancefloor at 3:30am. They’re on their own little circle dancing around. They’re not terribly good dancers normally but apparently are awesome with dancepoles. Naturally, most of the guys here want some action but it was not to be – Each of these girls had an personal security detail of 1.5 men for a total of 8 security guards. It was fucking insane. I have never seen professional dancers get so much security! Either they are really famous from where they originally came for, or they are really are paranoid of guys like me coming up and grind attacking them from behind. Seriously, imagine dancing in a club and you are SURROUNDED on the floor with big fat islander security guards. WHAT IS THE POINT?

MC Loves me
The MC tonight mingles with the crowd and checks my footwork, and he likes it. But christ, when I realised he was looking at me, I got the nerves and I couldn’t keep dancing. I just sort of fucked up and felt like an idiot. I hate impromptu dancing for other people. They expect some awesome routine that I have in store. Well, I don’t really have one.

Later in the night MC calls me out for standing against the wall resting. He tells me to start dancing again. LOL oh my god, talk about demanding!

Arrivederci
Club seriously started to die around 4:000, with a fight breaking out and girls leaving. I finally left. The Chicken-Katsu girls left at the same time as me. I had to wait until security cleared the entire area for them to leave properly. Pffftttttttt.

Recommendation
Note: Next week new promoters are coming in, so dont judge this review or previous Havana reviews on future nights. That said, for tonight, from what I experienced, Havana tonight gets a 6.5/10.

I’m sure it was more awesome earlier in the night.

A birthday for a friend. She has chosen Havana, so here we go!

Assessment Time: 22:45- 1:30am
Website: http://www.havanaclub.com.au
Address: 169 Oxford St, Darlinghurst, Sydney
Dress Code: Casual OK. Hats OK.
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: $25. $20 on guestlist (?)
Guestlist: see website. No problems getting in
Inside: One central dance floor, three bars. Private room in the corner, and lounges everywhere.
Cloak Room: Yes
Music: ‘Scouse’ House and Trance. It was actually pretty good tonight, as the DJ has a big group of songs to choose from. Of course, he chose some of the popular house songs as well as mixing it up with a bit of progressive trance. It was pretty good i would say.
Crowd: Dominantly Euro, some Aussies.
Entertainment: Dancers on the podiums. No MC’s tonight, but dancing chicks are good enough for me.
Atmosphere: Good vibe. Not as packed as the Chocolate City RNB nights, but still busy nonetheless. A good vibe in general.
Video: 360 View from the dancefloor

Click here to view the embedded video.

Timeline:

How far would you let your GF go with another guy? A Q&A Session with James Tran:

One of the girls I know comes up and dances with me. She may have been a bit drunk… So lets have a Q and A session to best reflect of what had happened with this girl..

Q) James, is it cool to dance with you when I have a boyfriend in the same club?
A) Sure. It’s just a dance.

Q) James, is it cool to grind with you when I have a boyfriend in the same club?
A) Dunno, probably not, unless you explicitly allowed each other to do so.

Q) James, Dude, you’re grinding with my girlfriend! WTF??
A) I wasn’t grinding with her. She was grinding with me. I too, wasn’t cool with it, and I kindly reminded her that you were still in the club,  but I didn’t exactly push her off. I was just being neutral, standing there.. the pole to her strip tease. The Switzerland to the world.

Q) James, is it cool to tell you that I’m not wearing a bra while boyfriend is watching?
A) Well that’s nice to know. Just make sure he didn’t hear you, or you’ll be in biiig trouble. (which he didn’t). In a normal situation without loud music, I would advise not to do it. Besides, you should be telling your boyfriend that you’re not wearing a bra, not me!

Q) James, is it cool to sandwich you in the middle of me and my hot friend while boyfriend watches?
A) Oh hell yes!!! A Sandwiching god does exist.

Boyfriend finally arrived to take the pretty girls claws away from me. (they have now since broken up at time of writing)

Lady Gaga
I Met her! Well, I sort of met her. She has an awesome disco stick.

We steal someone’s booth
We didn’t quite steal it. The sign was still up there. It was a girl’s birthday, but the birthday girl wasn’t there. A friend had found the birthday girl, sitting in front of the DJ booth, with her girlfriends, looking quite bored. It was their first time in the club and they didn’t want to dance.. or even try. That’s a boring birthday.

Drug ladies
Two larger girls drop by and sit down. This was their booth as well. We all became friends. We left the two girls to chat up our non-dancing friend. After about half an hour, he has told us that one of the girls force fed him MDMA for free. (The free bit was the most important bit). The guy that they were with was a drug dealer.

Funny that the police dogs were here earlier, and they didnt catch him out.

Also as an aside, why is it that people assume that I know how to get drugs?? I don’t have the faintest idea where to start. Sure, drugs are a part of the experience, but alcohol is good enough (and bad enough) for me. I digress.

Coda
We leave early 1:30am as the designated driver has to leave.

Recommendation
7 out of 10

The place could have a better atmosphere with more people. Music is great though.

My booth reserve sign at Havana

Chocolate City / Candy Paint @ Havana
Assessment Time: 11:30pm – 4:00am
Opening Times: 10:30pm – 4:30am
Website: http://www.myspace.com/chocolatecitysydney
Address: 169 Oxford St Sydney
Dress Code: Casual ok. I had a t-shirt and jeans.
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: $15 on guestlist. $20 otherwise
Guestlist: See website for link. I send mine to candypaint.fridays@gmail.com
Inside: Setup hasn’t changed. One central dance floor, three bars. Private room and lounges everywhere.
Cloak Room: Yes.
Music: RnB
Crowd: Mostly Asian
Entertainment: Podium dancers, fancy lights, MC

Atmosphere: Pretty busy and packed on the dancefloor, and surrounding areas.
Video:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Asian crowd at havana. Spot me if you can =)

Timeline

Free champagne and my little booth!

As part of my birthday booking I was given 2 free bottles of champagne. Sadly though we weren’t given the bottles at the bar, but instead were given 5 free champagne glasses each per bottle. Boo!! I want to pose with bottles. I suppose though, since so many fights can happen at these asian places, that its just plain safer to give us plastic champagne glasses. Speaking of fights.. there *was* a fight tonight at Havana between two asian guys. Both got kicked out. What is a night out at Havana without a fight?

Free bubbly! Served in plastic glasses. Classy.

Dancing with anything that moves

I was drunk. When james is drunk, James dances and grinds with any female unfortuate enough to be on the dancefloor.

Apparently I conversed in this conversation with a friend:
Me: “Grind with a girl”
Friend: “Who?”
Me: “I dont give a f**k. Dance with anyone!”

I then apparently proceeded to turn around and grind-attack the first girl in my sights. I must’ve done well initially, as it took her a good 15 minutes to shake me off, apparently anyway.

I do remember dancing with another fobby girl who didn’t or couldnt reject my advances, and near the end of the night dancing with a prawn, but she was really really tall and my eyes were lined up to her nipples. it was extremely difficult to dance and look up at a girl and avoid staring at what she is obviously flaunting.

I try to grind on an unluckily chosen girl.

Coda

We left 4am from pure exhaustion

Recommendation
If you don’t mind Asian clubs, and you like RnB, then this is a yes from me.
Chocolate City / Candy Paint @ Havana Club de Luxe – October 2009 – 8.5/10

Candy paint / Chocolate City
When: Every Friday Night
Entry / Cover charge: $25 general entry. Guestlist is free before 10:30 (chance of getting in before then is unlikely), $15 before midnight.
Attire: Casual accepted, including all hats.
Music: RNB
Crowd: Asian

Timeline
Jason re-appears
Got in and the first thing I saw was Jason, the Korean bum dancer from the Bamboo events. He was up on the podium doing his thing. I later say hi to him but he doesn’t recognize me, as usual – he probably has hundreds of fans saying hi to him randomly. The last time we met clubbing, I was in a fully fledged santa suit. Tonight I was just plain James. I think he was wearing his favourite green striped polo shirt. He must be sponsored by the polo green striped division.

My booth gets stolen
The organisers – so nice of them, reserved me one of the lounge booths at the club. So, what a surprise that when we got into Havana, when there was no longer one for me. All the other lounges had “reserved for anna” “reserved for Ben”, etc etc… and there was two booths which had their “reserved for” signs pulled down. One of them was mine!!! GRRRR which one stole my booth!!?? I didn’t really want to start a confrontation, so I let it go. This was definitely karma getting back at me for what we did earlier this year – we pulled down the “reserved for Susan” sign then stole her booth.

Music/Dancing
The 4 of us chose a orner near the DJ and danced our socks off. The place was packed to the rafters – It was the first time this year that Havana was completely packed on the dance floor. We were literally stuck in our corner and didn’t have the freedom to move anywhere – so we were really restricted to limited dancing moves such as  swaying, and “raising your hands in the air”, which happened quite often.

Music was typically RNB, and I had no complaints. Most of the DJ’s mixed it up well, chopping out the boring bits.

Otherwise quite a good atmosphere if you love your music and your asians

C tries to hook me up
She intoduced me to a Chinese girl she met last week.. from Bamboo. She was cute. Not bad at all. I said hi, and that was that. Later C tells me she tried to get us two to hook up. It didn’t help that I had a scream mask on when we were formally introduced:

Posing with an unsuspecting clubber

Waiting at the Cloak Room
Decided to leave at 2.25am and lined up.  There were about 12 people in line.  It took 50 MINUTES to get to my bag!!  It wasn’t really the cloak room’s fault. There were so many of those dodgy asians just pushing in or letting girls in front of them. I don’t care if you’re tired and want to go home. I’M TIRED AND WANT TO GO HOME TOO! I don’t care if you’re a girl. WHAT HAPPENED TO EQUALITY FOR ALL??? LINE UP BIZZATCH!! I don’t care if you’re pregnant. YOU SHOULDN’T BE OUT CLUBBING! (Ok, there was no pregnant chick but the previous did occur). In any case, the more people who pushed in, the more me and another guy got angrier and then finally he started to tell people off around us who tried to push in. It really tested our patience.

To make it worse, they started to play all my favourite West Coast 90′s rap music while I was stuck in line!! UGH!! The line was moving so slow, that the guy in front of us started falling asleep standing up. You know you’re in for a long ride when people fall asleep in the vertical position!  The staff even threw in another person to help alleviate the problems. It was a mess. I sent a letter of complaint the Monday after.

Coda
Still recommended for the asian rnb type clubber on Friday nights. Disrecommend using the cloak room at this point in time though

PS: Complaint: I sent a form al complaint later and was told that the regular cloak room staff were not working that night, however got no acknowlegement of what they were to do with the folk who were pushing in. As a form of saying sorry, I was also given 3 free all night passes to the Candy Paint / Chocolate City event next Friday, which was very nice of them again, but sadly I didn’t have time to take up the offer even though I was planning to go again!

Throughout the night I was wearing this thing

About Havana
Location: Oxford St, next to Stonewall
Website: http://www.havanaclub.com.au
Inside: Dancefloor – DJ at the front, lounges on either side with 4 bars. Enough to not wait long at all.

About Candy Paint
Music: RNB
Crowd: Asian
Dress Code: Casual Allowed. Hats allowed
Cover Charge / Entry Fee: $15 guestlist. Otherwise $20.
Occurrence: Every Friday
Atmosphere: Lively

Timeline
Got in, and it was still deadish ! Usually the floor would be packed, but it wasnt at all.

Borrowing a reserved area – for the entire night
There was a reserved area for someone’s birthday. Nobody was sitting there, so we just sat down. Nobody came to claim it back. Why reserve a whole lounge area when you are not going to turn up?

Dancing with C with observers
I can never get sick of dancing with C. She came at around 1am and we just danced it off – it always feels weird being outdanced by a girl, but its so much fun having people stare at you. I had two guys just stare at our footwork. My footwork wasn’t too good, but they still looked amazed at it. Perhaps they were 18. Oh the days when I couldn’t dance so well..

Atmosphere
The MC always keeps things lively. Somehow there was a glitch around midnight which was a bummer, but soon forgotten. Music was good in general in terms of RNB.

Coda
One of the girls got really really trashed so we had to leave. Still a good place to go ! However this year so far, the crowds haven’t been as large as they used to be.

The only rejection I enjoyed
Space was the first choice as it was rnb with fellow wogs and aussies (it’s Saturday, not Friday) We got rejected at Space because Tim was wearing old trackpants and a jacket from the early nineties. Reminded me of my brothers fashion sense. (thought: I need to get my brother some proper jeans this week, that lazy sod.) Dave got pissed off and talked to me about it as Tim went to get jeans from a friends place nearby. I supported the idea of abandoning Tim. Sue told us that Tim was begging to be back with her every moment he could. Tim was only here tonight to get back with Sue.

Quickie at sharkies:
Me and Dave went into sharkies to piss and more importantly, to have a dance. There were only two girls on the floor, dancing on the sidelines next to their table. We went up and somehow half integrated with them into a circle. We made some small talk with our partners. It felt jilted, but it went ok. We left on a happy note, full of happy stuff.

Breaking up is the hardest part:
Walked out of sharkies back to sue. She was in the middle of an argument with Tim. She didn’t want to go back to him. Dave stepped in (he’s a big guy) and repeated to Tim what Sue had said. Tim didn’t get it. After threats back and forth, it culminated in Dave getting his shirt ripped, and Tim attempting to smash a bottle on his head but missing. Tim ran off and we didn’t see him again that night. Sue was upset and apologized to me for such a bad start to the night. I didn’t know what to say. Dave looked ok but the happy stuff had disippated.

We went down oxford st and some guy gave us free passes to Havana. So ends the biggest lead up to our main destination..

Havana nightclub:
The venue has been covered before for Friday nights so here are some essentials for Saturdays:
Cover charge: $15. Free before midnight with a free pass.
Crowd: aussies and wogs. Young. More guys than girls. Girls were good.
Music: house. Commercial.
Atmosphere: tonight was busy. Friendly crowd.

Experiences
Entry: It was much more packed than Friday nights. That’s for sure. Perhaps everyone here had scored a free pass off that guy on the street. I went to dance, while the girls bought drinks for themselves.

Girls don’t hook up with posers.
Me and Dave went to random girls. I would pull off a pose that always scared the girls. They would walk away or turn their shoulders to me. Cold. Oh well, that was fun while it lasted. Just needed to write this as a reminder not to use this technique on strangers.

Alcohol is good
It wasn’t long until the girls got drunk. Sue hooked up with a random named Aaron, also drunk. I spoke to an 18 year old guy. It was his birthday. Even he had two blonde bombshells by his side. Was I missing something? I was quite possibly the hottest guy that night! I’m an exotic asian from the far east. Please westerner, take me!! Oh well… I guess it’s about confidence and personality too, which I don’t have.

Music:
It was good. Enough said. Almost all the songs had me going until the end of our night. They only played a few commercial tracks, the rest was good house.

Alcohol is bad
I am sitting next to sue and alisha who are so drunk. Sue is crying about how aaron ditched her. I really didn’t say anything because 1, I had no advice, and 2, she was drunk and wouldn’t remember anyway. I took a break to the toilet. I came out 30 seconds later… There was a FIGHT!!

Fight!
That’s two fights in two attendances at Havana. It was Aaron punching it up someone! He was fighting some other guys, who tried to crack onto Sue while I was gone. Crazy. They kicked out everyone except Aaron, who sported a large cut to his knuckle. Sue and Alisha kept drinking. Really crazy. They were drunk but looked sober so were able to buy more drinks.

James Tran goes babysitting
I had to ask the bartenders to stop giving alcohol to the girls. I felt like a babysitter at this time instead of a dancer. I was, by now, constantly looking over from a distance they were ok and hadn’t gotten into another altercation with any of the guys they openly flirted with. I even had the crossed arms and shaking head as the drunken stupendour personified by two girls happened before my eyes.

Aaron left and the girls gave chase to follow out of the club… It was 4am. Suzanne thought she was superwoman and tried to fly down the stairs by leaning over and falling forwards. I wasn’t strong enough to carry suzanne off her legs, so I dragged her as her feet clopped the stairs. Aaron was next to her telling her that she didn’t take him seriously and wasn’t going to enter a relationship. She wasn’t listening. Meanwhile, each time she found her footing, instead of walking with me, she tried to jump and fly down the stairs again. Sympathetic Aaron finally helped me halfway and carried her down, his mouth still blabbering about suzanne not being serious.

Coda
We finally got outside. Crazy.

What happens when you try to walk two drunk girls down oxford st (Babysitting part 2):
- the girls run onto the road outside havana and nearly get hit by taxis.
- I ran to the median strip and gripped both girls tight as traffic rushes by, praying to any god out there that I don’t lose grip and let the dogs out.
- Suzanne randomly throws Alisha’s jumper in the air. It lands on top of a tall signpost. The drunk girls desperately try to jump and climb the pole. Hilarious.
- gay guy walks by. The girls break free and tell him how hot he is. I regrab and walk on.
- guy with pizza comes by. Suzanne is so hungry she reaches to get his pizza. I say “no!” and try to pull her arm back. She manages to rip half his pizza slice but my arm grab makes suzanne drop the pizza on the ground. She still wants to eat it. I had to stop sue from grabbing the pizza off the pavement. Big apology to the guy.
- another gay guy. More chaos until I can drag away.
- girls then start yelling out “JAMES IS THE COOLEST ASIAN EVER.. WOGS ARE SO HOT.” throughout.
- every remotely looking caucasian is asked if they are wogs or aussies. Either response is met with a “I HATE AUSSIES! WOGS ARE HOT!”
- Straight guy. Sue spills her story. He talks to her. Sue, then instantly declares “I’M GETTING SEX TONIGHT!”. The guy instantly lights up and sits her down. Maybe he can take both girls off me so I can go home. He leaves after she mentions the baby.
- I’m pretty much inserting a swear word in between every other word by now. The girls collapse and lie on the ground laughing. I groan, pull both up and the dragging continues. It’s a great look isn’t it – an asian guy dragging two white girls to who knows where..
- After a few more men, straight and gay, we finally reached our final guy before the station.. a police officer. “OMG A POLICE OFFICER!!”. They break loose and run towards him, hungry for something. The officer was withdrawing money from the ATM and almost thinks the girls are trying to rob him. The officer grabs his money and runs away. Girls chase and I have to grab and drag them back again…

Overall
Go if you’re bored on Saturday and just want house.

Cover charge:
$15 at the door
$10 if you guestlisted. Visit www.havanaclub.com.au to email your guestlist.

Music:
House / Housexy

General:
I got there just before 11pm. There was no line. Got straight in with casual clothing. Security didn’t screen me for weapons- this had to be non-asian.

Walked in and there was a about a 15×20 centre dance floor with a DJ playing house music. Surrounding the floor are carpeted areas, which in total, hold four bars with loads of lounges and stools. Here’s a diagram from the website:

Havana map

No, you can’t click to find out more..

Atmosphere & Crowd:
There were already a bunch of girls dancing. It was darkly lit. People are lounging around enjoying drinks and what not. It’s not as empty as I thought it would be. I actually can’t find a seat- everyone. Nobody is standing around looking lonely, except me, since I really didn’t know anyone. Would’ve been more relaxing if it weren’t for the house music blaring around.

The crowd is probably 60/40 Aussie / Euro, all white. Crowd is loud and friendly, and most are here to dance, the rest to make out. During the night I spotted probably only 3 non-whiteys.

Main floor: Midnight

My timeline:
I went alone, so basically I went straight to the floor. Early in the night, there are a bunch of girls dancing. I was apprehensive of being the first guy, so I waited a few minutes until some guys went onto the floor. I think they were gay, as they kept checking me out, with one of them giving me a massive bear hug!

How to dance with heels on
So anyways, there this one nut bag chick who was a most impressive dancer. You had to see her body shake like it was possessed – while wearing heels! Her secret was to rock her body back and forth while moving arms and shoulders in the opposite direction. This minimized the need to reposition her legs at all. So girls, yes, hard to picture, but that’s how you can dance with heels on!

Fight! (and should one be allowed to record them?)
Around midnight some commercial house starts to play. They were playing “NYC Beat” (uptown downtown turn the beat around..), but it’s ruined by a sudden brawl between 2 guys in one of the lounge areas, with everybody trying to separate them.Havana is a small place so everyone stops dancing while the brawl erupts. I couldn’t do much to help so I recorded it to post up here on the site.

While I’m filming some girl pulled down my camera with her hand. Then said to me “don’t !!” with a very pissed off look. Well what else was I going to do.. Dance? There were at least 3 other people recording with their cameras, with a better view. I didn’t see you try to stop them! friggin oath.

Who let the girls out?
After the fight, a lot of girls left Havana. I did a headcount and the ratio of women to men was 6 to 1. Sigh. Even though I came here to dance, the atmosphere is almost always more fun when there are more girls. I’m sure you guys agree.

Post fight
Not much really. I danced and got lots of compliments. Despite the new anti-smoking laws, there were still some people lighting up, especially later in the night when its more relaxed.

The place was basically empty at 3:30am, so I left soon after.

Post mortem:
A nice place to go if you like house and an aussie euro crowd. Plenty of bars meant very short lines, which was very nice. Lots of lounges sets the mood to relax and pickup. The big fight was a bit of a mood killer though, took some time for it to get under control.

I would go again but with a small entourage. There wouldn’t be enough room for a big circle of any sort on the dance floor. Otherwise large crowds would need to grab one of the lounges available to retreat to during the course of the night.
to retreat to during the course of the night.